Taaaatu!

How do you express your gratitude?

Teaching gratitude to my older kid was very easy, she would meet your eye, smile, and say a polite thank you. The younger kid, on the other hand, always turned beet red, opened his mouth and eyes wide, and looked down, so getting him to acknowledge and say ‘thank you’ was extremely tough. Most often, his beet-red face and downturned eyes were acknowledged as his gratitude. But this was insufficient for me. I wanted him to say the words. I wanted him to make eye contact AND say the words.

And that’s where the story started. With the acknowledgment first and the gratitude next. I have prompted him more often than I care to remember or acknowledge, but I’ve done it enough times to also know that it takes a lot of consistency and effort. The best part of this exercise was the fact that I had the teachers and coaches join in as well, so what started as a stumbling exercise became a wonderful game of ‘who said it first”. For me, acknowledgment and gratitude are extremely important, because that tells me that my children are aware of the effort it has taken for someone to do something for them. I didn’t want to raise entitled kids or worse, kids who did not realize the value of a service done for them.

I remember the time the boy was a toddler and would walk with his grandmother around the condominium. She always wore a sari, and he would be in his favorite attire a pair of jeans and a shirt. They usually walked a couple of rounds and then would go to the park to try a turn on the swing. For a condominium with close to 1000 apartments and even more children, just the single pair of swings in a tiny corner of the park proved to be woefully insufficient. So, getting a turn to play at the park was a noteworthy event. And the days the boy got to visit the park he would return super thrilled at this amazing surprise – beet red in the face, eyes and mouth as big as saucers, too shy to voice his gratitude. But as he recounted the stories he realized he forgot to thank her for the visit to the park. He rushed out of the bathroom, slipping and skidding on wet feet straight into her room jumping on her bed to give her a tight hug and thank her for a fun evening at the park.

We started young. We started slow. We started small. If my child received aid or help in any way, for instance, if they had someone tie their lace for them, or if someone handed them a toy they dropped or even helped them put away their toys, they had to acknowledge and thank them. A door opened or even the bus-didi helping or assisting them off the school transport. A thank you for your service always goes a long way. I’ve always practiced it and I insist they do it as well. Often when you miss gratitude, you assume a level of entitlement that you don’t deserve.

Many years later while we were on a mixed family visit to Singapore, we visited one of the many water parks. My kids were a lot older and they were thrilled to be the perfect height to be able to go on most of the rides. Up and down around and around they ran like headless chickens having a blast. The kid was about a year old and was napping when the older kids took off like rockets across the water park. We had booked a cabana for our group and here I was with the baby and her swimming paraphernalia, which included the swim trunks and arm floats. When she awoke, I got her changed into her swim trunks and put on her arm floats. The plan was to head into the kiddie water park. When I reached the area, I realized that the rides and facilities were geared for a slightly older child. But the kid had something else on her mind and she wriggled and squirmed forcing me to hold on tighter. Eventually, we reached the wave pool and we waited for the waves to start. The kid continued squirming and her nap only made her efforts that much harder. This tiny bundle of energy wanted out of my arms and I was terrified to let her out of my arms. The wriggling child and her age ensured that all the lifeguards had their eyes trained on me.

I re-checked her arm floats to ensure they were at the right pressure and slowly let her float in the water around me, in my arms, while I turned slow lazy circles. The wave pool was started and I ensured that the kid was well above the waves, merely skimming the top every time a wave hit. That first wave and the kid stopped squirming and just let her arms float and let buoyancy do the trick. And immediately, I got a loud, “Taatu” her version of ‘thank you’. After that, I heard the giggles every time a wave hit and a loud giggle followed by a louder “taatu”. We continued to turn around lazily, and she was thrilled to be in the wave pool with me, eyes closed, just floating around in circles still in my arms saying a happy “taatu” every single time. When the wave pool stopped, she was rather upset, her eyes shot open and although we continued turning around in circles, she wasn’t too thrilled about not feeling the waves lapping around her.

The sun was harsh that day and the 15 minutes at the wave pool was exhausting, but convincing the excited kid that it was time to take a break at the cabana while the waves also recuperated from the harsh sun was an effort, but I made it work. The 15-minute break at the cabana was a welcome respite and I pulled out the park brochure to see where else I could take a toddler. This was my first trip to a water park with her and what an eventful time we had. Her giggling ‘taatu’s had made my day. And I am forever grateful for the opportunity to have spent that exclusive time with her. So, if you ask me how I express my gratitude, I would say loudly and clearly and as often as I can. Because my heart filled and burst for every “taatu” that’s come my way since that day in the water park. And I would like everyone to experience those tiny flutters of happiness as always.